Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Roiling up a dust storm to rid
themselves of flies, pastured bison
look prehistoric, huge plush heads
bobbing as they writhe on the ground.
Their hides look bulletproof yet
men on passing trains wasted
entire herds by shooting them
and leaving the carcasses to rot.

These look relatively pampered,
but will become buffalo burgers
on a thousand backyard propane grills.
Bison don’t belong in New England.
Clouds of deerflies, horseflies, greenheads
madden them, while the range
lacks the distant horizons
bison evolved to exploit.

I want to touch their bulky faces,
stroke away the insects; but creatures
like these resist becoming pets.
I want to write their history,
but they wouldn’t want to read it,
nodding over the largest typeface
with boredom gruff as a snore.

Back in the car and driving north,
I glance in the mirror and catch
one bluff critter sticking its tongue
into the humid air to taste it,
but also razzing me goodbye.
The morning seems a little riper
for having featured bison.

I drive that much more firmly
on the narrow country road
to prove I can’t be herded quite
as easily as bison. The light
simpers with half-suppressed humor
and the stony look of pastureland
ages toward a change of season
that’s creeping up from my knees.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Stumping from ledge to ledge, surf
creaming a few feet below,
I find I’m not as agile
as the Vinalhaven summer
we wasted on each other
decades ago when the ashes
of Vietnam circled the globe.

Looking into the sunstruck water,
I detect a thousand shipwrecks
clinging to the weedy bottom.
You’ve named half of those sinkings
after yourself, half after me.
Shingled houses overlook
the point. People who live there

can taste the surf every day,
“healing, illimitable salt”
that couldn’t heal the mutual
lobotomy we attempted.
On a tiny pine-trimmed island
a lighthouse I can’t name lures
the eye. Through binoculars

I watch a man stroll up the ramp
to enter the forty-foot tower.
On that island I could pass
the rest of my life on crosswords
and boring old novels no one
in this new century should read.
The rocks try to break my ankles,

but I’m still too smart for them.
I avoid the slippery tide-smut
of rockweed and plant my steps
firmly on grainy surfaces
so I don’t fall the way you fell
into the worst kind of wealth,
all surfaces polished to kill.